Volo Museum is a treasure in our community which is a destination for cars, antiques, dinosaurs, food and family fun. It is also the site of numerous documented supernatural occurrences. In this Halloween season, you can take it all in by joining the “Halloween Experience Trolley Tour.”
The trolley begins with a narrated presentation of the paranormal happenings on the Volo grounds. Led by very talented actresses and actors in character, they describe the tale of the hauntings at Volo.
On the west end of the property, there is a small and very old cemetery that is easy to miss if you are not looking for it. It is here where Henry Wallace Gale was buried after loosing his life in 1863 during the civil war at 20 years old. The land the Volo Museum is on was a dairy farm owned by Henry’s family and he seems to be at the heart of the haunting occurrences.
Security cameras in the antique mall have recorded shadowy figures and objects falling off of shelves in the middle of the night. Visitors have described being bumped while no one was near them. A trucker arrived on the property late one night and decided to sleep in his truck until operations resumed. In the morning he was visibly terrified as he described an apparition walking around outside of his truck cab only to enter the antique mall by going through the wall.
Most recently, the Titanic exhibit was the scene of another unexplained event. A mysterious flood occurred late one night. Security footage showed water rapidly rising. “We thoroughly inspected everything, and there were no broken pipes, roof leaks, or any other obvious points of entry for such large amounts of water. Even the perimeter of the building, with a concrete floor, was dry with no evidence of cracks or holes,” said museum director Brian Grams. “This is a total mystery.”
The paranormal activity has been investigated by many groups, including Joe Cicero and Tina Bree of “105.5 Mornings” who spent a night in the main barn of the antique mall which is now 176 years old. Bree and Cicero both attest to the haunting. “It was an eerie feeling all night,” Bree said. “I was physically moved by something, which makes me believe something is there. Next time, I want the lights on.” Cicero said, “After experiencing what we did, there’s no doubt there is something supernatural.”
While riding along in the old trolley, the colorful thespian crew does a brilliant job of taking you through the tales of haunt.
In Volo style, things tend to be done big and the Halloween Experience is no exception. The trolley ride also takes you through a vast sea of giant Halloween inflatables located on the 75 acre expanse on the north side of the property. There is everything from Ghost Busters characters to King Kong and monstrous spiders.
Full tours are available from 7 to 9:30 p.m. Friday evenings or 11 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays from Friday, Sept. 20, to Sunday, Nov. 3, for $16.95 each. Halloween Experience Express Tours, which last about a half hour and head straight for Halloween Town with a voice-over production, cost $7.95 each and are available from 7 to 9:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Thursdays, Oct. 8-31.
For the best experience, we enthusiastically recommend the night time tours. But no matter what time you go, just be sure you do. You don’t want to miss it.